


505: Part Three

by acosmist_t



Series: Draco Malfoy One Shots [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Guilt, Memory Loss, Post-Hogwarts, Rape/Non-con Elements, Reader-Insert, Romance, Self-Harm, Survivor Guilt, Torture, Yearning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:28:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27518392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acosmist_t/pseuds/acosmist_t
Summary: Part 3 of 505. You have fully begun readjusting to the Wizarding World, with the help of Draco Malfoy, that is. But now, you are determined to retrieve the memories you swore you lost- no matter what.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Reader, Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley
Series: Draco Malfoy One Shots [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2020781
Comments: 6
Kudos: 30





	505: Part Three

**Author's Note:**

> Word Count: 11.6k
> 
> Warnings: dark themes- torture, tiny form of self harm, alcoholism, hints at non-con but only if you squint, just overall darkness and bad coping. 
> 
> a/n: i love everyone has shown love for 505 and its finally being ended. i know this chapter is long but i just had so much to put in so i hope you enjoy. i will be making tag lists for all my fics so leave an ask if you’d like to be put on the list for a specific character. ALSO THERES BOUND TO BE REALLY BAD TYPOS BUT IF I HAVE TO READ THIS ONE MORE TIME IM GONNA SCREAM ILY

You had woken up in a cold sweat with a scream buried somewhere deep in your throat.

Another nightmare, flashback, reminder.

At least this time the sun was already rising when you woke up.

Cool air greeted you as you threw off the covers and began to get ready for another eventless day dealing with all things Muggle-related. Your stomach turned throughout the same routine you followed morning after morning.

You spent the next ten hours in a state of distraction with a lingering sense of nausea. By the end of the day, you were starving and had no appetite for food. So, in an attempt to solve the issue, you visited a Muggle coffee shop on your way back to the apartment.

Caffeine was what you needed. Sharp and energizing.

A shock to your system.

The bell rang lightly as you entered the shop and embraced the warm feeling of coffee and fresh pastry. The line was short and as soon as you knew it, you were ordering a large drink.

You ignored the scorching of your tongue and sipped it quickly. Your feet carried you to the door but something made you pause. Turn around. Search the many faces of the customers now crowding the small shop.

A head of platinum hair that was getting increasingly more familiar caught your eye. He was standing at the register with a face twisted with confusion and irritation, likely from having to deal with Muggles.

You smothered your amusement and, in a moment of possibly bad judgment, you walked up beside him, a laughing smile on your face.

Draco jumped when he saw you, the scowl on his face configuring into a small smile after seeing your own. Something about it made your heart stutter.

“Struggling?” you asked him, the same smile playing on your lips.

His scowl returned. “These Muggle places make no sense. What the hell is a cappuccino and why is it so different from a latte?”

This time, the situation got the better of you and you barked out a laugh. Draco’s eyes twinkled slightly, but he shut it down quickly. 

“A latte has more milk than a cappuccino and less foam,” you answered.

He raised his eyebrows, still not understanding.

You eyed the flask peeking out of his pocket and the fingers that were nervously playing with it. The distressed look in his eyes. “Either way, I don’t think that’s what you’re looking for,” you pointed subtly to the hand. 

His expression hardened but indicated for you to continue.

You turned to the cashier. “A large hot coffee, please. And go easy on the cream and sugar.”

The cashier was all too happy to finally get an order. “Can I get a name for that?”

“Draco Malfoy.”

Out the corner of your eye, you saw Draco tense and he looked to be in physical pain as you spoke. Had you said something wrong? You looked at him curiously, but he just shook his head.

_ Forget it _ , he spoke with his eyes.

The cashier took the order quickly, and while Draco tried to figure out Muggle money, you pulled out your own cash. You ignored his protests as you paid for his drink.

“Consider it a thank you. For the other day,” you added. He tried to protest again, but you had already reached for his wrist to pull him along.

But as you neared it, he flinched, hiding the hand behind his back. He watched the hurt flicker in and out of your face and began apologizing. “Sorry.  _ Fuck _ , that’s not what I meant.”

You began walking, gesturing for him to follow. You tried to hide the guilt. “No, it’s my fault. I don’t like quick movements either. And I shouldn’t have reached out like that anyway and I didn’t even consider that we’ve only  _ just  _ started having civilized conversations after Merlin-knows-how long and even after that-”

He cut off your babbling with a chuckle, an unknown look in his eyes. “Y/N, that’s not what I meant,” he repeated. “It’s just that you had reached for my left arm,” he shook the arm lightly, signaling to his forearm, “and it’s a bit...erm...sensitive.”

You wished you had told someone to put  _ ‘Death by Mortification’ _ on your gravestone because that was surely how you’d go.

But Draco reached his right arm out for you, indicating for you to take it. “It’s all right,” he said. “Really.”

Gingerly, you wrapped your hand around his right wrist, not missing the way he jumped slightly. When the coffee had finished and was placed on the waiting bar, you dropped his arm and grabbed the cup instead, now carrying both yours and his drink.

This time, you  _ tried  _ to miss the way that a little disappointment filled you because you were no longer touching.

Draco was silent, thinking, as he followed you to the farthest and most secluded seats from the crowd. It was two oversized armchairs and a small circular table in the corner, light coming from a dim lamp behind it all.

Once seated, he reached for his own cup and took a sip, disgust filling his face. “How do people drink this shit?” he asked, lip curling.

You brought your knees up to your chest and your cup close to your face, breathing in the warmth. Your eyes met his over the lid and your heart tightened. “I ordered it for a reason.” He watched as you quickly snatched the flask that was close to falling from his pocket.

His eyes tracked your hands as they grabbed and set both of your drinks down onto the table, removing their lids. You opened the flask and a familiar smell greeted you- firewhisky.

Excitement filled you as you poured the alcohol into both of your drinks, the majority going into Draco’s.

He looked like he could use it.

Then, you replaced the tops and handed it back to him. Watched him sip once, twice, a third time.

The twinkle returned along with a slight smirk.

“A day drinker as well?” Draco asked, impressed.

“Whatever gets me through the day.”

Something more than just understanding flooded his face. His eyes tracked as you bit your lip nervously. He turned away, hand tightening around the cup.

Unlike what happened in the lift, conversation flowed easily between you. Almost as simple as breathing. You felt comfortable with him- and that unnerved you. How could you be at ease with a Death Eater?

_ Ex-Death Eater _ , you reminded yourself.

You wanted to laugh or maybe cry at the fact that talking to Draco felt like second nature. That the years spent arguing and fighting were all for nothing.

And maybe it was the firewhisky or the low lighting or the way that you had finally found someone else who hadn’t gotten over the War, but next thing you knew you were telling Draco so many things.

Personal things.

You sensed the anger from earlier again, but you realized something else with it. It wasn’t directed  _ at  _ you- it was more like it was  _ about  _ you.

Baffling, that’s what it really was.

And just as confusing was that Draco was a surprisingly good listener.

“So what about you?” you asked after a while of mindless chatter. “Why would Draco Malfoy ever be found in a Muggle coffee shop?”

His picture-perfect image blended with a bit of shame, but not completely muddling it. More like adding character. Adding depth.

“I’m not always so welcome in the wizarding ones. They only know me from my Death Eater days, nothing more. It makes them nervous.”

Fighting the urge to reach out and grab his hand, you teased, “And the coffee part? You don’t seem to have much experience with it.” 

“Just trying to find something to stop me from all the...” He waved his hand over his flask, cluing to a clear dependency on the alcohol.

You smiled. His pale face obtained a light pink color on the cheeks.

He really was ashamed.

Compassion sent an arrow through your heart. You knew what it was like to search for something, anything, that would come close to healing you. The coping mechanism he adopted during wartime had turned out to be the thing destroying him the most.

“Baby steps,” you assured him.

He smiled back.

-

A lifetime and no time at all had passed.

Draco missed this, missed you.

The drinks were long since finished, the tipsiness long-faded. You must’ve been in the shop for at least two hours. It was just as it had always been between the two of you.

His fingers itched for a quill and a certain black journal, the little firewhisky in his system not doing enough. Draco had to occlude in order to hide the pain, the loss he was feeling.

But he would sacrifice himself if it meant you had someone to talk to. There was this blushing whenever you thought you had spoken too much or when Draco had been quiet for a long time, but he made it a point to reassure you. To encourage you to keep going.

The Ministry mandated that he see a Healer for his mind. A therapist, they called it. And though he had hated it and gave them the bare minimum, they had still pounded into his head the importance of not bottling emotions.

Even if he didn’t think that applied to himself.

The tides turned, however, when you brought up the one thing he desperately hoped you wouldn’t.

Memory loss.

“I just,” you paused, “feel like a piece of me is missing. Gone. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to handle it.”

Guilt threatened to eat him alive. “And you never went to the Healers about it? Or even therapy? I heard it’s very popular in the Muggle world.”

Your voice had quieted, a small, sad smile forming. “I never thought I was capable of it. To relive it all. I would think that to be a horrible existence, wouldn’t you? To live bound to the past? I couldn’t wake up every day and live beside those memories.”

He was drowning. There was water filling his lungs, rising and rising and rising. He did this. He  _ ruined  _ you.

His fingers no longer craved ink and parchment. No, he was beyond that, beyond just ‘coping’. He needed something stronger, to numb him, lidocaine in the form of a burn at the back of his throat and warmth blooming throughout his body.

His left forearm itched.

His right hand obliged. 

He felt the scabs reopen, the trickle of blood flow down his arm. He welcomed it, welcomed the physical pain because it was still a better alternative to the mental.

Permanent scratches marred the Mark. It started as an attempt to disfigure, to change its branding. Soon, it shifted into the sheer effort of ridding himself of it.

One of his few wishes in the world was to feel clean again. Unbranded. Unblemished.

Minutes of silence only disturbed by his subtle scratching later, Draco managed to respond slowly, “I believe that pain is a part of life, and that to know you are still alive- and I mean truly alive, not just surviving- is to let yourself feel that pain. Because you will learn that even mental hurt has the potential to be fatal.”

Your eyes glistened and Draco froze again, praying he didn’t hurt you. He watched as you reached a hand out and gently placed it on his left arm- over  _ it _ . 

He didn’t flinch this time.

Your other hand held his left one, allowing the blood that had dribbled onto it to get on your skin, stuck between your hands. He realized that maybe his scratching hadn’t been as unnoticeable as he thought.

Your voice was warm and soothing as you spoke. Coaxing, even.

“And I believe, Draco Malfoy, that you ought to start listening to your own advice.”

-

_ Dear Y/N, _

_ You have never once failed to amaze me. _

_ In every way, in every shape, in every form, you are the reincarnation of Hesperus. _

_ My own personal Evening Star. _

_ The world could be crashing down around us and I would be content to sit and watch it all burn, if only so you could be my last, so very beautiful sight. _

_ I wanted to be mad, angry, enraged. I wanted fury to blind me rather than guilt. And you know what? I almost failed. _

_ I’m sure it was clear as day- at least to you and your gift for reading me- that the grief had begun to consume me. _

_ But you, my love, had saved me yet again.  _

_ I have not a single doubt in my mind that you are my salvation. _

_ And for the first time in months, I hadn’t drowned myself in firewhisky last night. I hadn’t gotten wasted to avoid dealing with my thoughts. And as stupid as that may seem, as pathetic as it is, it was a huge fucking step. _

_ And I like to think that if I were to tell you that, you wouldn’t laugh. That you’d be proud of me. _

_ My heart is going to explode, _

_ D.M. _

-

He had inspired you.

Right before you had first left, you made one visit to St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. It was a final attempt at finding your missing parts and pieces.

In desperation, you had begged them to test you for the memory charm. It was the last answer you could think of- that your memory had been erased.

But they had turned you away.

_ War causes all sorts of trauma _ , they had told you.  _ Even  _ if  _ you were obliviated, there are no ways for us to reverse it in your current state. _

Because memory charms are not designed to be undone. At least that’s what most people thought.

But you distinctly remember Harry telling you about Bertha Jorkins and how the Dark Lord had reversed the charm Barty Crouch placed on her.

Through torture.

It didn’t matter how much you tried and pleaded, they still refused to help you.

Draco had inspired you to try again. You had never found out if the memory charm had actually been placed on you, but you were more than willing to try now. You  _ had  _ to know. Because if you knew who'd cast the charm, you would know who had written the letter that you read every night without fail.

That’s why you now stood in a small room, bright fluorescent lights reflecting off the brighter linoleum floors. You were picking at your nails in an effort to distract yourself while waiting for the Healer.

And the world seemed to be working in your favor because just as you thought it, Healer Kelpis walked through the door.

He was a short old man that held decades of strength in his aged bones. Kelpis looked exactly as you remembered him, kind eyes and a kinder smile.

The same eyes and smile that turned you away the first time you had approached him.

“Hello, Ms. Y/L/N. It’s nice to see you again,” he said politely.

“It’s nice to see you too, Healer Kelpis,” you responded.

He asked you why you were here. Previous inquiries.

Are you feeling okay? Just peachy.

How has readjusting been? Just as peachy, if not more so.

Have you seen a mental health professional while you were gone? Definitely not.

Why haven’t you? Been just too peachy to need it.

Kelpis was annoyed. He rammed you with the same questions in different wording over and over, but he only ever received the same answer.

That you were completely fine except for the fact that you weren’t.

You explained the situation. How you wanted to test for magical memory loss. And if it were true, if you had been  _ obliviated _ , you were willing to go through any treatment necessary. At any cost. You  _ needed  _ the memories.

After all that and more, Kelpis finally agreed. “I suppose we can run a few tests...but we wouldn’t receive anything conclusive for at least a few weeks.”

You grinned because this had been the best news you’d received in a long, long time. “That’s all right, I can wait. Can we start now?”

The Healer sighed and shook his head, a smile on his face. “Yes, we can start now.”

You felt like 11-years-old again and getting your letter to Hogwarts. 12-years-old and Hermione had just been unpetrified. 13-years-old and you just saved Sirius Black and Buckbeak. 

14-years-old and Harry was lucky to be alive and that was enough for you. 15-years-old and you just barely made it from the Department of Mysteries but at least you and your friends were still breathing. 16-years-old and…

And what?

Your grin fell.

-

You were wasted. Piss. Fucking. Drunk.

It had been over a month and St. Mungo’s never sent back your results. You weren’t dumb, you knew what that meant.

Nothing was wrong. There was no charm, no abnormality, no anomaly. You did this to yourself,  _ you  _ were the reason you were still suffering. Nothing and no one else but your own stupid self.

Why the fuck were you in so much pain? Why couldn’t you just be fucking normal?

Why in Merlin’s name were you sitting in a dirty Muggle pub gulping down what felt like your hundredth drink? And why was it still not enough?

You giggled and swayed precariously on your stool. Muggles were crowding near you, peering at you, putting arms around you.

_ They’re going to take advantage of you _ , the back of your head said.

_ Shut up _ , you told it and buried it down, unconcerned with the danger.

You wanted to let yourself go, forget about everything around you. Let someone else take the wheel for once. The memories and loss were too much to handle tonight and you dreamt of having not a single responsibility, not a single thought in your head.

Your hand went up to signal you needed more of what you’d been drinking for at least an hour now. Or maybe something stronger…

“Don’t listen to her,” a flat voice told the bartender from behind you. You spun to see Draco Malfoy looking down at you, noticeably less alcohol in his system.

You giggled again and pushed him back, nearly falling off the stool in the process. “ _ I said _ another Cosmopolitan, please. Or wait,” you paused, faux-thinking, “ _ whisky _ , instead.”

Draco went so still you thought one touch would send him crumbling to the ground. He grabbed your elbow and pulled you up, still gentler than you expected he’d be. He grabbed a bundle of Muggle cash that you could tell was way too much and dropped it down onto the bar.

He began to pull you out of the bar, but a sweaty hand latched onto you and pulled you in another direction. An equally gross voice that made your skin crawl murmured by your ear, “Leaving so soon?”

You pushed away but Draco already had the man’s chest slammed up against the wall, the same arm that touched you twisted painfully behind his back. The deadly look in Draco’s eyes told you all you needed to know about what was being whispered into the man’s ear.

The pub darkened and you felt the world tilt on its axis. Your arms went out but before you could fall, an arm banded around your waist. But unlike the previous one, this arm, this hand, this safety net was secure.  _ You  _ were secure.

Draco called out from beside you, his voice everywhere and nowhere at once, “Pans, let’s go.”

You jumped and stared around, looking for who he was talking to. Your jaw decided to make friends with your shoelaces and hang down there as Pansy Parkinson, Theodore Nott,  _ and  _ Blaise Zabini walked up to you, somehow finding a way to stay grounded as the earth fell out of orbit and took you with it.

Your stomach turned and you felt your nausea rise up once more. The now-larger group pushed out of the bar and you gulped down the cold night air hungrily. Your knees buckled and you lurched forward and emptied the near-empty pits of your stomach into a bush.

Draco reached and pulled your hair back. “Did you eat anything today?”

You shook your head, feeling like death. “I haven’t been able to keep anything down,” you murmured.

“Idiot.”

A laugh escaped you, but was interrupted as the nausea increased tenfold. In the back of your mind, you registered a hand rubbing in small circles on your upper back.

“We’re going to Apparate to my manor, just let me know when you’re ready,” Draco told you.

Fear coursed through you as you looked back at him. Draco you could handle, even enjoy, having around. But Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy were a different story.

You shook your head violently and thought of the picture you must’ve made. Bent over and shaking, a deer in the headlights, sick and drunk.

“Relax, they moved out to one of our country homes earlier this year. I have the manor to myself.” It was scary how easily he could read you.

After a few more minutes of dry retching, you regained your balance enough to straighten and tell him you were ready. “At least Apparate me to a toilet, I’m going to need it.”

He laughed again and looked to the others, ensuring they were ready. Then, he wrapped an arm around your waist to Side-Along Apparate with him. “Hold on tight.”

Your hand gripped firmly onto what you soon realized was his left arm. But before you could grab on somewhere else, he started Apparating.

You were being squeezed through an impossibly small tube and everything pushed together and you were twisting and turning and your head felt heavy with cotton.

It had been too long since you last even came close to Apparating.

Suddenly, there was hard ground underneath your feet and you would’ve fallen towards it if it weren’t for the arm still banded around your waist. A lapse in judgment and care had you leaning into Draco’s body.

“Bathroom,” you pleaded/moaned/groaned.

He listened.

He carried half your body weight as you stumbled up a staircase and into a black and white marbled bathroom. It was exactly how you expected it to look. Draco reached into a closet and pulled out a towel and a spare plastic toothbrush and handed them to you.

“We’ll be downstairs if you need us.” He rubbed the back of his neck a little nervously. “Pansy’s here too, if you need her,” he added.

You nodded and pushed him out the door, locking it once it was closed. Privacy, peace, isolation- that was what you needed.

The Apparition made you even woozier, and you kneeled in front of the toilet, only spitting up bile. Maybe you shouldn’t have kicked Draco out so soon.

The shower warmed quickly as you turned it on, the steam melting the little makeup stubbornly sticking to your face. Every part of you relaxed as the warm water met your body, and you had to hold back a groan of pleasure from it. 

You scrubbed your body raw. Raw of feeling, raw of emotion, raw of heady alcohol. Letting the feeling wash over you, you picked up one of the many soaps in Draco’s collection and breathed in the clean scent.

It centered you, sobered you. You watched as rivulets of water ran down your body, racing through the curves and soft angles. It was a little beautiful.

After a long time that still felt too short, you exited the shower and brushed your teeth, paying special attention to your tongue in hopes of removing the disgusting taste from your mouth. It seemed Pansy had conjured a pair of clothes onto the vanity in the bathroom, and you happily put them on, making your dirtied ones disappear with a wave of your wand.

As you padded down the stairs, you finger-combed your hair in an attempt to improve the awful first impression you must’ve made earlier. The Slytherins were clearly very close, a tightly knit group that had to face so much scrutiny from such a young age.

You almost choked on air at the scene taking place when you found them.

Pansy was dancing provocatively on the table, clearly drunk, to a slow waltz. It appeared to be a mocking of an interpretive dance.

An amused Draco met your eyes and beckoned you over to the couch he was sitting at alone, and you were still laughing as you sat down on it, curling up by the other arm. He wordlessly handed you a blanket, sensing your coldness.

“Thank you,” you mumbled.

You weren’t talking about the blanket.

His eyes warmed and he shook his head, your gratitude unnecessary. He turned back to watch Pansy continue her show, Theo and Blaise cheering her on.

Without turning your head, you reached a hand out slowly and grabbed his, giving it a small squeeze, a small message, before letting go.

_ I’m sorry _ , it said.

But before you could fully pull away, he caught it, giving your hand two squeezes of his own.

_ I’m here for you. _

-

Theo had joined Pansy on the table, both of them missing shirts and risking brain damage from falling.

It had started out as a game of Truth or Dare- plus a little alcohol to speed things up.

After he had brought you to the bathroom, Blaise had been waiting with three bottles. Butterbeer, vodka, and firewhisky. Draco got first choice.

This was different. He wasn’t drinking out of pain or to cope. No, this was a small gathering of his closest friends. Very different.

Right?

He hadn’t expected to find you at the pub alone tonight. Had been filled with a special sort of anger when he did find you, anger partly aimed at himself. Draco didn’t want you to turn to alcohol like had- like he still did.

And the rage only increased when he noted the people hanging around your drunken state. He wanted to kill anyone that so much as took one step too close- nearly did kill the one who had grabbed you.

He had to remind himself to keep his cool. He wasn’t your owner or protector. He was just a friend, that’s all.

“So what were you lot doing at a Muggle pub?” you asked, mainly speaking to Pansy, Theo, and Blaise. Draco had already explained his reasons.

Pansy collapsed dramatically onto one of the couches and reached for the vodka in Blaise’s hand. She drank deeply before answering, “Pub crawl. These wizards don’t like us enough to leave us to ourselves.” She shrugged, “Perks of being Death Eaters, I suppose.”

“ _ Ex _ -Death Eaters,” Draco corrected. It was like she was trying to scare you off.

Pansy wrinkled her nose. She pulled up her left sleeve and pointed to the Dark Mark standing in stark contrast against her tan skin, looking directly at you before turning to Draco. “Once a Death Eater, always a Death Eater, Drakey-poo. Or did the Dark Lord not beat that into your brain enough.”

He was waiting for you to flinch, to cower, to scoot as far as possible away from him. But you didn’t. You sat there relaxed, just absorbing Pansy’s words.

You weren’t afraid of him. Didn’t hate him.

“Grow up, Pansy. War’s over and all we have to show for it is a glorified tattoo,” Draco retorted a little halfheartedly. 

He couldn’t help the slight speeding of his heart, nor could he the hand that wrapped around the neck of the bottle he kept to himself the whole night. His throat burned.

Shame snaked up his body as he noticed your eyes watching him. Not judging, not condescending, only watching. A small, comforting smile.

He considered putting the bottle down. Not drinking anymore. Staying as abstinent as you for the rest of the night. He wanted you to be proud, to see that he wasn’t some ex-Death Eater with a taste for firewhisky.

That smile stopped him. Played on a loop in his mind.

He really did consider it. Truly.

But that was where it stopped- consideration.

He raised the bottle back up to his lips.

It tasted like sympathy and burned just as bad.

-

_ Dear Y/N, _

_ I… _

_ Truly, I have no words. I’m at a loss because I’m racking my brain for the right vowels, consonants, syllables to place in neat little lines to form sentences, paragraphs, emotions. _

_ Why did you have to go to the bar? _

_ Why am I so hung up on you that I can’t get the picture out of my mind? _

_ In a way, I’m mad. And I know you would chastise me for having anger be my only outlet, but nonetheless, it’s how I feel.  _

_ I can no longer distinguish what I’m angry at. Is it me? Is it you? Is it the memories?  _

_ I don’t think it could ever actually be you. Merlin, if I could, I would put you on an altar and spend the rest of my meaningless life worshipping you. I would rip myself open and sacrifice every part and piece of me for you to survive on. _

_ Scarlet blood would be dripping from my eyes in the form of teardrops and falling down to you. I am bound to you. Blood and flesh; mind and body. _

_ It’s quite gruesome if you think about it. _

_ Perhaps I’ve begun to sound like a broken record, but I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell you that St. Mungo’s had made a completely irrelevant mistake. The two weren’t tied. When you get that message, those results, it will be exactly what you want. _

_ Long after Pansy and everyone left, you had sat next to me on the couch and told me why you were drinking yourself away tonight. That you had been denied the one possibility that had kept you moving all this time. _

_ My heart shattered into a million sharp and irregular pieces, too broken to glue back together. _

_ The tears in your eyes, the heartbreak. It hurt. _

_ I wanted to tell you so bad- so, so bad. But I can’t do that- I’m too much of a coward. _

_ You told me you’d never forgive me- never accept me. I can’t handle that. _

_ When you brought up the letter, I nearly died right there. _

_ I wasn’t the person you were expecting. You were looking for someone bold like a Gryffindor; kind like a Hufflepuff; brilliant like a Ravenclaw. _

_ What you were not looking for was someone evil like a Slytherin. _

_ But that was a funny thing. Before, whenever I brought my own malevolence up, you always rebutted it with one thing: _

_ “You call yourself evil. The bad guy. But I don’t believe that, not for a second. And even if you were the so-called enemy in my story, that doesn’t change a thing. Because maybe I don’t mind dating the villain. Maybe I’d even prefer it. Maybe the world feels a little better because I know that if you ever were to lose me, you’d burn it all down until you could bring me from the ashes.” _

_ I never had a response to that and it never left my mind. It stuck with me for so long because it was so perfectly true. _

_ Because yes. I would set the bloody world on fire- I nearly did the first time I had lost you.  _

_ And I would dig you out, dust you off, and together we would rule a land of ruin and embers. _

_ Until the very end, _

_ D.M. _

-

After your drunken experience, you and Draco began to get closer.

It started off small- little touches here, surprise coffee shop visits there. It was all kept very light, fun, easy.

It was just what you needed.

No connections, no ties, no loose ends. He asked nothing of you and neither did you of him.

You learned the dynamics of his and the other Slytherins’ relationship. How they had grown up under the eyes of too many. How the dark arts had alienated their lives. Pansy and Draco had put on a show throughout Hogwarts, a display to pacify their parents. 

Blaise had shut down so bad over time that Draco was one of the few people he could relax around. They had been the closest within the group, more than friends- brothers.

Your heart especially broke for Theo. He had always maintained a bubbly persona, never faltering and constantly smiling. You hadn’t expected to learn about the brutal beatings he endured growing up. The way he had been blamed for his mother’s death.

Homophobia ran deep within the Notts. And Theo coming out as bisexual hadn’t helped.

Every Saturday, the group went out for drinks and returned back to Malfoy Manor to celebrate another week survived. Because even though the Battle of Hogwarts may have ended, theirs had not.

They began inviting you to come with them. And you swore it started to feel a little like a family.

-

Weeks passed by without your notice. In a good way.

You had never expected to be a Gryffindor inducted into a group of Slytherins. It was one of your favorite things to happen.

They had such a passiveness among them, understanding. Harry, Ron, Hermione- all of them- were always asking something of you. Always begged you to give a little more. Take the initiative, heal yourself. You couldn’t sit around in sadness for the rest of your life, could you?

But Draco, Pansy, Blaise, Theo- they never asked you for anything. They were all struggling with their own issues, so they would never pass judgment onto yours. Nothing was ever brought up, but the minute you wished to come clean about something, they would have nothing but ears and eyes open, an arm ready to comfort.

It almost made you believe that maybe you didn’t  _ need  _ your past.

That maybe you could make new memories.

-

The day it had arrived had been one of rain and thunder.

A storm brewing that promised power and change to follow in its wake.

You had always loved storms. The steady pitter-patter on the windows, the rumbling in the distance, the flashes of light. So many people were all experiencing the same exact storm as you, and you’d never know their stories. Something about it was relaxing- therapeutic.

However, the one time you  _ didn’t  _ enjoy the rain was when you had to walk to work in it. You had to sit through the day stuck with a chill and wet socks.

The most undesirable of mixtures.

But the day was not completely ruined because the only thing better than a storm was a storm spent in a coffee shop. Draco was on his way to walk with you to the shop you two regularly frequented. You had to find a way to pass the time or else you’d be staring at a clock for the next half-hour.

A few minutes before he was expected to get to your work, you remembered to check your mail. The first few weeks after your visit to St. Mungo’s, you had checked for letters obsessively. But now, not only have you stopped expecting anything, but you had also begun not to care so much.

Despite that, you couldn’t hold back your excitement nor the sudden shaking of your hands when you found a letter designated for you from one St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.

You fought the tremors as you walked out of the mailroom, opening the letter as you went. In the back of your head, you registered the lift dinging, indicating someone had just arrived. 

The letter was apologizing. There had been a delay in their mailing system that prevented many messages from being delivered for weeks. 

Then, the letter was giving you results. Your eyes scanned down, down, down until-

**Memory Charm:** Positive

Your entire body was shaking. This, this right here, was what you’d been waiting for two and a half tortuously long years. These were your odds, your opportunity.

And there wasn’t a single chance you weren’t going to grab it by the neck.

Your eyes broke away from the paper to see Draco a few feet away, curiosity with a dash of fear on his face. You subconsciously felt tears falling and before you could realize what you were doing, your arms were around his neck.

You were hugging Draco Malfoy.

He was still for a moment and right as you considered pulling away, his arms came around you, holding you to him. His chest rose and fell slightly, barely breathing.

The letter was crumpled in your hand and emotions were overwhelming you, but you had enough sense to whisper around the tears, “I was right. And I’m going to get my memories back.”

He tensed once again. But when you finally pulled back, his arms tightened for a moment, almost like a reflex. Maybe you were insane, but Draco almost seemed reluctant to let go.

It took you a moment to realize that those were tears in his eyes as well.

-

_ Dear Y/N, _

_ you’re tearing me apart _

_ -D. _

-

He couldn’t do this.

You were going to get the memories back. Memories  _ he  _ stole from you.

You would never forgive him.

Would he even be able to help you? Could he do that to himself? It was the most acute form of torture. He wouldn’t survive it.

He was in deep-fucking-shit.

-

Linoleum floors. Bright lights. St. Mungo’s was a mirror image throughout.

You had scheduled your appointment almost immediately after you received the letter. Anticipation had weeded its way into your bones.

It felt like ages before the Healer finally arrived. He was unfamiliar and wore the same lime-green robes as everyone else there. The Healer sat down and began explaining the treatment plan.

“First of all, I’m Healer Luca. I and a few of my colleagues will be in charge of your case. The details of your memory loss are quite intricate, and whoever had cast it must’ve been quite skillful.”

You searched your brain for possibilities and probabilities, but arrived at nothing. You hadn’t a single clue as to who could’ve been so advanced- at memory charms, of all things.

Luca continued, “If you were to ever remember or have an idea as to who cast this charm, it will make things much easier. Since they put the charm on you, they would have the best chance at removing it. I’ve been told you already have an understanding of how a memory charm is to be reversed?”

You nodded your head, mouth not capable of forming words.

“Well, then you know that there is a unique type of treatment. It is quite rare that we allow a patient to undertake the process, but given that you are a hero and friend of Harry Potter, we will let you.”

He moved on, “You have to be completely certain this is something you want. The Cruciatus Curse is not a kind one- but it is the most powerful and useful. I’m sorry to say that none of what is coming will be pleasant.”

The Cruciatus Curse.

An Unforgivable.

You waited for the fear, the hesitance, the second thoughts. But nothing came. You had not waited this long to let one little curse stop you. And besides, you had already faced it before during the Battle.

It was one of those things you kept pushed down, the memories of the Dolohov cornering you, laughing in your face after killing Lupin. You wanted to return the favor.

But he had seen this on your face. Decided to play with you a bit. You had completely let go when he Imperiused you. Made yourself forget what happened. But the pain of the Cruciatus never left you.

You never thanked Professor Flitwick for saving you. It was too little too late.

Ignoring the paleness you knew entered your face, you turned back to Healer Luca and nodded again. “This is what I want. I’ll do whatever.”

The Healer made you sign a million different contracts and liability forms. This was not something that could be undone.

“We can start today if you’d like,” he offered.

You smiled, “Yes, I’d prefer that.”

The next thirty minutes were a blur of explanations and making sure you were ready. They told you how, since your case was so unique and complex, you’d be administered a memory potion as well as the Curse. They wanted to do everything they could to make this as easy as possible.

And finally, they brought you to a new room. This one had the same floors, same lighting, but it was empty aside from the metal table in the center. And the straps that were attached to it.

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.

The thought of being trapped and tied down with no way of getting away was more horrifying than any curse they could’ve cast on you. The world moved in slow motion as they led you to that table and strapped you down.

They asked one more time if you were okay and ready.

You nodded numbly, not so sure but unwilling to go back now. You drank the memory potion they had handed to you and shut your eyes, clenching and unclenching your fists.

Everything echoed loudly as you heard, “ _ Crucio _ .”

-

It started as pain.

Pain everywhere, pain in your bones, pain in your lungs, pain in your heart. It didn’t stop. No, it only increased. It was hurt in your head that reached all the way down to the tips of your toes, leaving not one inch of skin unexposed to it.

Your skin was being flayed, acid being thrown, every nerve set on fire. You barely registered your body arching off the table, only kept on it by the straps you had been so concerned with just moments before.

Silly mistake.

It was immeasurable. There were hundreds of thousands of white-hot knives being dragged across your skin, puncturing and burning everything. 

During the Battle, you had barely understood it all, too distracted by everything else, adrenaline running. But now...now you could feel  _ everything _ .

And if the physical pain had been bad, the mental was absolutely brutal. You couldn’t see anything, your eyes were rolling in pain, but you felt so much more.

It was your family screaming at you for being so weak. Your friends looking at you in disappointment because you could’ve done something, anything, to stop all of this. The dead spread out through the Great Hall, so many lost.

George Weasley bent over his twin's body, shouting at you through the tears.  _ Why hadn’t you stopped this? You could’ve saved him! You did this! _

You were strangled by guilt and sadness so heavy that you thought you’d never recover. Your heart sank down and shriveled up. The pit of your stomach was endless and everything felt through it.

Then, it shifted. You saw stars- no, not that kind. You worked around the pain to see hundreds of beautiful and bright stars shining in the night sky. It was a perfect view from one of the many towers at Hogwarts.

Your chest tightened. Tears began to fall in earnest. Wherever you were, whatever familiar scene you were watching, you wanted to go back. Would do anything to go back.

Your hand had just reached up to your neck to feel something, a piece of metal-  _ a ring? _ \- when everything changed again. The stars began to wink out, one by one, and you were thrust into the darkness.

-

“Draco, slow down.”

He ignored her. His feet pounded quickly on the tile, searching and searching for your room.

Pansy grabbed his wrist, stopping him. “Draco.”

“ _ Pansy _ .”

“She’s going to be fine. They told us she was still breathing and alive,” she urged.

Draco shook her hand off, dragging his own through his hair, breathing ragged. “You know just as well as I do how bad the Cruciatus is, don’t act like you don’t. She’s probably never experienced it before- and at least we had each other the first time we felt it.”

They had been relaxing at the manor, waiting for Theo and Blaise to arrive for drinks. None of them ever spent much time alone in their own homes anymore, the silence was too haunting.

A small piece of parchment had appeared on the table with Draco’s name on it. All he had to see was ‘St. Mungo’s’ and your name together before he Apparated directly outside the hospital, Pansy right behind.

The wards prevented anyone from Apparating in, so they had to wait a painfully long time to even find out where your room was. As usual, the wizards were wary of having a group of ex-Death Eaters hanging around, but Draco’s name had been your emergency contact, so they had to let him through.

As for Pansy,...well, she never did take no for an answer.

“Of course I know. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re running yourself into the ground here. Do you want her to remember you or not?” Pansy asked as they began moving again, a slower pace this time.

He stayed quiet and focused on finding your room. Draco didn’t have an answer to that- had been trying to find one for months. Obviously, he wanted you to know him again, to be happy.

But would you really be happier if you knew? Would he? Because while you would get the happy memories back, you would also get the bad ones. You’d feel everything.

Love, happiness, sadness. Hate.

And what’s more, you were risking so much in trying to retrieve your memories. You didn’t care about the permanent damage the Curse could bring onto your mind. The Slytherins grew up facing it, they were molded to be the perfect weapons. To infiltrate Hogwarts.

Some people never recovered from it.

Draco breathed a heavy sigh as they reached your room. His heart stopped when he entered and saw you unmoving on the bed, save for the slightest rise and fall of your chest. He began to walk towards you but was quickly slammed against a wall.

“What are you doing here, Malfoy?” Harry Potter glared at him.

Except Draco’s eyes didn’t- couldn’t- leave your still body. The redness on your face. The almost-dry tears left on your clothes. There was a slight tremor in your right hand that stopped his breathing completely.

Potter snapped in front of his face, trying to get his attention, but Draco was too far gone. He was being killed ten times over, his eyes never leaving your closed ones.

Thankfully, Pansy stepped in. “Are you taking care of her, Potter? Is that why you’re here?” There wasn’t so much malice as there was precaution in her tone. She wanted to make sure you were okay.

“Of course I’m helping her. She’s one of my best friends. What I want to know is why Malfoy,” Potter gestured wildly with his hand, “came rushing in here.”

“Do you know why she’s here?”

“I know it has something to do with recovering lost memories. And that  _ Malfoy  _ was marked as her emergency contact. But they called me anyway, and I don’t blame them, I wouldn’t trust you lot around here- around her.”

Pansy scoffed. “Dimwitted as ever. Do you know how they treat a memory charm, Potter?” He stayed silent. “No? They use the Cruciatus Curse. Your ‘best friend’ just had to be tortured because none of you bloody Gryffindors could be there for her enough so that she wouldn’t feel so dependent on recovering those memories.”

Potter had the nerve to look embarrassed, but before he could respond, Pansy was already dragging a barely-there Draco with her.

“Lots of fluids and bed rest. She’s not going to want to eat for a while, but make sure she has something. There’s going to be lots of tremors and soreness, so find someone to massage them out- it works wonders,” Pansy told him on her way to the door.

Potter crossed his arms, stubborn as ever. “And why would I trust anything  _ you  _ have to say?”

“We have more experience than you think,” she snapped right before slamming the door.

They went back. Back to the manor, back to the quietness, back to the cold bottle in Draco’s hand and the warmth it brought with it.

-

_ Dear Y/N, _

_ Is this what death feels like? _

_ I don’t think I’ve ever experienced something quite so painful. It hurts, bloody hell, it hurts. _

_ I thought I would fall apart when I read the message from St. Mungo’s. And then when I saw you unconscious on that bed, there was no thought about it. _

_ I fell and fell and fell. _

_ My handwriting is barely legible right now thanks to the guilt, the fear, the firewhisky, but there’s so much feeling in it. _

_ If I had never erased your memories, you wouldn’t be where you were today. If I had done it differently, you wouldn’t be lining yourself up in front of the Cruciatus. That stupid Gryffindor bravery never lets you stop. _

_ They tortured us in those last few years. Voldemort wanted us to be perfect and prove our allegiance. It wasn’t just Cruciatus, he used other methods, other things to scare us. _

_ I remember every time I came back from a trip home, you would hold me. You would take care of me. You said you wanted to take all the pain, all the hurt away. And it worked. _

_ Where are you now? _

_ Oh, right. I lost you. Pushed you to go get yourself tortured because you’d do anything to undo what I did. _

_ Anything. _

_ You said your soul knows mine. _

_ So, can you feel me breaking? _

_ I wish I could go back, _

_ D.M. _

-

It was hell and you couldn’t stop going back.

The Curse was the worst thing you ever felt, nothing compared.

But every time you went back, you felt something return to you. It wasn’t much, just tiny glimpses, but it was something.

Sometimes it would be incredible. Dates by candlelight, your heart feeling fuller than it had in months. 

But sometimes it was sad. You would relive waking up confused on the floor of the Astronomy tower, your wand thrown to the side, your hand holding onto a letter for dear life, and your heart feeling as if it’d been broken and shattered beyond repair.

The Healers were getting anxious, however. You lost weight and barely slept, the Curse taking so much from you. And they had warned you that at a certain point, they had to stop trying, the risk of brain damage would get too high.

You weren’t concerned with the treatment, though. You could get over the pain- you already partly had.

Draco was what really concerned you.

In the beginning, it was like you  _ felt  _ something was off. Something not quite right and it was accompanied by a slight pain in your chest.

It felt like heartbreak and tasted just as bitter.

What was worse was that he had distanced himself. Practically disappeared from you. 

You were still invited to drinks with your new friends (because that’s what they were- friends) but you stopped going after a few weeks of Draco all but ignoring you. You apologized over and over for your absence, blaming it on work, but they heard none of it.

All you knew was that everything in the world had become wrong. Backward. Incorrect.

Pansy and Theo spent many nights at your place. They would say it was because Draco was in another one of his ‘moods’ or that they had gotten bored of his manor, but you knew the real reason.

They were worried about you.

They had become your family, and now they were taking care of one of their own.

-

Tomorrow was your last treatment.

They had spent two months administering it along with a potion whose taste never seemed to leave your mouth.

Any more of the Curse would have you stuck with permanent damage, you’d never recover. Still, you kept asking them to do a little more, push a little harder.

Harry had been there for you the whole time, replacing Draco as your emergency contact. It had been nice to talk to your old friends more, but you still missed the Slytherins.

At least Harry tried to help you. He took you all over Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade, trying to jog some type of memories from your last years, but nothing ever took.

The worst part had been walking into Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes and seeing Fred’s face. You knew it was George, but their identicalness made you stop in your tracks. You half-expected George to yell and scream at you as he did in your nightmares and Curse episodes.

But he didn’t. He just walked up to you and enveloped you in a hug. It was caring and remembering and forgiving.

And that was even worse.

It was midnight. 14 hours to go until the treatment.

You were nursing a bottle of butterbeer and a small headache. Sleep was beyond you, and besides, there were other things on your mind.

Tomorrow was your last chance. The Healers had been nervous about giving you even that much. If things went wrong, it was more than likely that you’d never recover. Your best chance would be to find the caster of the charm, but you knew there was no chance.

For all you know, the caster of that charm and writer of the letter could’ve died during the Battle. There was no hope of finding them.

But what really filled your thoughts was Draco. You missed him. Over the months you spent together, you had felt something grow between you two. An understated tie.

Perhaps it was because you had found solace in each other or maybe it was something more, but you would never forget it. You knew what you had felt had grown past ‘just friends’.

You stood up abruptly, butterbeer swishing out of the bottle, your balance uncontrolled. Maybe you had drunk a little too much. You grabbed your wand and threw on a hoodie, preparing yourself.

Your hands collected the remaining grains of confidence and strength you had, filling them into an hourglass you prayed would last until tomorrow. Fear threatened to overcome you but you shoved it down quickly. You had to do this.

Feet collided roughly with the ground as you Apparated to the entrance of Malfoy Manor. You gave the front door one knock before pushing it open and entering. The wards only allowed for specific people, and you were still on that list.

The house was dark and silent as you walked through it, but you knew Draco never slept this early. You crept up the stairs and tried to listen for any sounds to clue to his location.

A nearby crash had you jumping and pulling your wand. It sounded like glass shattering loudly, as if it were thrown. Your feet picked up pace as you searched for the source and arrived in front of a door, light spilling from the crack underneath.

It was Draco’s bedroom.

You pushed the door open slowly, careful to not scare him. “Draco?” you called out quietly.

Your heart stopped and started again at the sight of the room. A glass cup had indeed been thrown at the wall, shards and what looked to be firewhisky covering the floor. The bed was made perfectly except for one spot, a small journal and quill sitting on it.

It was a nice room, honestly. Clean, minimal, comfortable. It reminded you of him. It smelled like his cologne mixed with a bit of clove and mint.

You almost tripped to your knees when you saw him.

Draco was crumpled in the corner. His suit jacket disregarded, eyes red-rimmed, body shaking horribly. You watched as his right hand scratched violently at his left forearm, blood beginning to drip onto the floor.

You stumbled forward and to your knees in front of him, feeling your own eyes water. “Draco,” you repeated.

He looked at you and you felt as though you were dying. There was such brokenness, such pain contained within the grey.

He was beautiful.

Not in the way that conventional things were. You weren’t thinking of soft hair, nice bodies, chiseled faces. No, he was beautiful for his mind. Beautiful in the way that he felt so much, his brilliance, his sacrifice, his ability to love. He was the beauty you find in heartbreak, because the only way to truly appreciate the beauty of something is to see the pain that hides behind it.

Your arms came around him, letting him lean on you. You would take away his pain, his hurt, everything. You would absorb it like a sponge, allowing him to drop his tears, his baggage, his heart, and you would pick it right back up.

You wouldn’t mind sacrificing that bit of yourself. Only for him.

It was silence only interrupted by occasional sobs, after which you’d hold him a little tighter. You ignored when your arms got tired or your back sore, you could care less.

After at least an hour, you helped him stand up. Brought him to the bathroom and leaned him against the counter. You searched for all the right items and began to clean his Mark.

His body was frozen, the muscles of his arm tense. Your touches were light, feather-like, excruciatingly gentle. You wiped the blood away with a wet washcloth, wiped away the pain.

Eventually, he began to relax as you leaned into his body, the side of your head against his heartbeat. You carefully applied a salve and bandaged the arm softly, making sure not to move too quickly or push too hard. 

When you were done, you washed your hands and cleaned everything up. As you went to exit the bathroom, Draco right behind, he stopped you. His hand grabbed your wrist and you turned around worriedly.

Your eyes were met with his face millimeters away. This close, you could see the slight marbling that you had noticed in the lift so long ago. You watched as his eyes watched you bite your lip nervously, a habit you never seemed to give up.

“Thank you,” he breathed.

So much was held in those two words.

“No need to thank me,” you whispered back, eyes tracking down to his lips.

Your heart began beating faster as he leaned forward and you could see each individual eyelash. Closer had your lips just touching, a light graze.

You gasped lightly at the sensation and he moved.

His lips met yours and you felt fireworks explode in your stomach. It was a soft kiss cradled by even softer hands. His fingertips traced your jaw, a barely-there touch. You were backed into the door frame as you responded, hands grabbing his shoulders.

It was a sweet kiss, the type of innocence you pray to protect. To coddle. It was a kiss that said a million words. 

You felt the hands now holding your jaw shake slightly, and you threaded your fingers through his, your hand over his. You steadied him.

You kissed him like you had practiced for this moment all your life- because that’s exactly what it felt like. Muscle memory.

A piece of you felt returned.

-

Sometime later, the kiss broke.

Again, he murmured something that sounded like, “ _ Thank you _ .”

Your hand reached for his and you pulled him to the bed, sitting him down next to the black journal, which he picked up and shoved into the nightstand. You decided not to ask.

Standing in front of him, you threaded your fingers through his hair and tilted his head up slightly, giving you access to press a small, chaste kiss to his forehead. 

Draco responded by pulling you into the space between his legs, arms wrapping around your waist and head resting into your stomach. Your hands went back to his hair and shoulders, rubbing small, comforting circles.

But it was over quickly, and Draco pulled away to whisper one thing.

“Stay?”

You smiled lightly and nodded. “Always.”

He sat back against the pillows, kicking off his shoes and socks beforehand. You did the same and moved to the other side, laying down next to him.

The light went out and darkness consumed the room along with the moonlight that flooded in through the windows. You felt his hand slip into yours and he kissed you quickly, barely lasting a second. 

His hand squeezed yours once.

_ I’m sorry. _

You squeezed back. Once. Twice.

_ I’m here for you. _

-

The room was cold as Draco and you entered it. He was nervous, really nervous.

You had asked him to come with you to your last visit, a show of strength. And of course, he listened. He would follow you anywhere.

What you hadn’t told him were the risks that came with this visit. He nearly pulled you out right then and there. He held himself back, though, because if this is what you wanted, then he wouldn’t stop you.

Draco paused, however, when the Healer brought up the issue with the charm caster. He could undo this, undo everything. It was on him.

Could he do it? Would you be happier if you knew? Because he would sacrifice his own happiness as long as you were okay.

He would suffer without forgiveness if it meant you no longer suffered at all.

But at the same time, could he  _ crucio  _ you? Was he capable of inflicting the same torture he had grown up dreading?

As soon as the Healer stepped out, Draco pulled you out of the room and into the corridor.

You looked at him curiously, but he was already speaking. “Do you have the letter?”

Nodding slowly, you responded, “Yes. Why?”

“Hold on to it. Okay? Don’t forget it.”

Draco saw the Healers coming from the end of the corridor and pulled you back into the room. The Healers entered soon after and looked at him suspiciously, the strength of which competed with your look of confusion.

One of the Healers stepped out of the line. “Are you ready, Y/N?”

You nodded and began to walk to the metal table, Draco’s blood turned to ice and he truly grasped what he was about to do.

“And you understand that if this does not work, you’ll have to live without the memories forever and risk the potential for more trauma?” the Healer continued.

“Yes, I understand everything. Let’s go.” You drank the potion the Healers handed you quickly, a sour look on your face.

_ Always so strong _ , Draco thought. He knew that you could survive anything- even this.

Bell towers began to ring in his ears as he watched one of the Healers raise their arm, ready to cast the Curse on your strapped body.

They rang as he interrupted them, explained to them that he could do it- that he had the best chance of giving the memories back.

They nearly burst his eardrums as your face shifted from confused, to betrayed, to completely shut off. You put on a mask of coldness.

But nonetheless, when the Healers asked if you were sure that you wanted him to cast it, you silently nodded, eyes piercing straight through his soul.

Draco felt himself die a little when he raised his wand and breathed, “ _ Crucio _ .”

-

Once again, it was pain.

Torturous, unadulterated agony.

And you would never know if it was because Draco was simply stronger or the fact that memories washed over you in a huge tidal wave of emotion, but it was the worst the Curse had ever hit you.

You heard yourself scream, thrash, fight painfully against your bindings. You wouldn’t survive it, you could feel cracks forming in your very soul.

But then, something else hit you.

Stars, the Astronomy Tower, moonlight on pale skin.

Hidden smiles, secret glances, quick rendezvous in the Room of Requirement.

A one-year anniversary, a new task, a forgotten boy.

The letter pushed into your hand, a plan taking form, tears falling because…

_ Death is better than forgetting you. _

Draco Malfoy erasing your memory because he loved you so much and you had loved him and you,  _ you _ , were his weakness. The Dark Lord sending him to kill you on May 5th because that was your anniversary and Voldemort was nothing if not sentimental.

Despite the pain, your hand slid down to the letter buried in your pocket and grabbed it tightly.

Your missing pieces were Draco Malfoy.

You wanted to laugh but the memories were being thrown at you at such a speed and there were a year and a half worth of thoughts, feelings, emotions and they drowned you and drowned you until everything turned black.

-

When you woke, it was sunset.

Orange light filtered in through the window of the hospital room, painting everything in a beautiful scene of golden dusk.

Draco was leaning against the far wall, looking more disheveled than you’d ever seen him. His shirt was untucked, hair mussed from his hands running through it, eyes a mix of red and purple.

No, he wasn’t disheveled. He was  _ destroyed _ .

It took you a couple of tries to get your voice to work, and even then, it sounded foreign to your own ears, brutalized from screaming.

“Draco?”

He jumped and his eyes met yours, entrapping you. You remember the first time you had noticed the exact storm-grey shade of them in fifth year. The moment you realized you were falling for him.

“Y/N?” His voice was just as bad, and you could tell by the tremors running through his hands that he was craving something. Badly, at that.

“Do you need something to drink?” you asked, making sure your voice came out as neutral as possible.

He shook his head and took a tentative few steps closer. “Of course that’s your concern,” he joked, “never anything about yourself.”

You ignored him. “Do you? I think I grabbed one of your flasks-”

“No,” he cut you off. “I’m trying to stay sober- at least for a day.”

“That’s incredible.” You grinned at him and watched a little bit of the tension in his body release. You remembered everything, meeting him, knowing him, loving him. Old memories blended with the new and made the most complete picture you’d ever seen. “Why are you so far?”

He watched your eyebrows draw in confusion and you reached a hand out. He moved a few steps closer, still not close enough. “I didn’t think you’d want me to. I lied to you for so long, charmed you to forget so much. Y/N, I wronged you so badly.”

You shook your head, chuckling. “I understand why you did what you did. And while I may have been mad before, but that was more towards the thought of losing you, not at you.”

Silence created a bubble around you, and this time, you were the one to stand up. Draco tried to get you to lay back down, but you wouldn’t listen.

Tentatively, you placed one hand over his heart and the other around his wrist, bringing his hand to rest on your throat. And just as it had in the Astronomy Tower so long ago, it curved gently.

“ **I probably still adore you with your hands around my neck** , remember?” you teased, your eyes showing the sincerity of your words.

Draco looked up, then around, going everywhere but onto you. And when he did finally look at you, the past came crashing into both of you. “ _ Fucking hell _ ,” he muttered. “You are going to destroy me, Y/N Y/L/N.”

You reached your arms around his neck, and he immediately embraced you, holding onto you for dear life.

“Is this real?” he whispered, his voice holding an unmistakable tremor to it. “Am I just dreaming?”

You backed up just enough to look him in the eyes and press a chaste kiss to his lips that still managed to convey every message that ran through your mind. “Nothing is more real. I, Y/N, love you, Draco. Despite the good, the bad, and the twisted, I love every piece of you.”

Tears were falling from both of your eyes. Once again, he looked up in disbelief. “I love you. So much. Promise me you’ll stay.”

You promised him that and so much more. All the time you had lost would be made up, the future you had planned would come true.

There were so many feelings, so many questions arising in your head. So many words that threatened to tumble from your mouth, but you kept quiet in fear of ruining the beautiful peace you had obtained. Because for the first time in so long, your feeling of forgetfulness ebbed.

You breathed deeply and accepted that nothing made sense except for the fact that Draco’s arms were around you and that you had the strangest inkling you’d finally made it home.

-

_ Dear Y/N, _

_ I’ve known what it is to have you. _

_ I’ve known what it is to lose you. _

_ And now, I’ve known what it is to find you again. _

_ So, I promise before every god, deity, and spiritual being there is that I will never ever let you go. _

_ My lover, my best friend, my saving grace, please do me the favor of never leaving me. Only death shall part us, and even then, I will be the one to wait for you, because surely I will not last one minute more in this world without you. _

_ Always and forever, _

_ D.M. _

  
  


**_fin._ **


End file.
